The Bolivar bulletin. [volume] (Bolivar, Hardeman County, Tenn.) 1865-1888, 1887-12-16
TALMAGE'S SERMON.
A Pertinent Inquiry: sIs Thine
Heart Right ?''
A sacramsntal Discourse, Showing the
Necessity of Keeping the Heart Right
By the Cultivation of a For
giving Spirit.

Upon recent sacramentaI occasion at
Brooklyn Tabernacle, Rev. T. Dewitt
Talmage took for his subject the "Saluta-
tion from the Chariot" !" his text being:
Is thine heart right?-H Kings, x, Is.
With mettled horses at full speed, for he
was celebrated for fast driving, Jehu, the
warrior and king, returns from battle.
But seeing Jehonidab, an acquaintance,
by the wayside, he shouts, ''Whoa whOa."
to the lathered span. Then leaning over
to Jehonidab, Jehu salutes him in the
words of the text-words not more ap-
propriate for that hour and place than for
this hour and place:
Is thine heart right?
/ should like to hear of your physical
health. Well myself I like to have every
body else well, and so might ask, "Is
your eyesight right, your hearing right,
your nerves right. your lungs right, your
entire body right? But / am busy to-day
taking diagnosis of the more irRpor taDt
spiritual conditions.
l should like to hear of your financial
welfare. I want every body to have
plenty of money, ample apparel, large
storehouse and comfortable residence;
and / might ask; It's your business right,
your income right,yegr worldly surround
ings rightp' But what are these financial
questions compared with the inquiry as to
"
debts to Gods as to whether you are in
sured for eternity; as to whether you are
running yourself by the long credit system
of the soul? 1 have known men to have
no more than one loaf of bread at a time,
and yet to own a government bond of
Heaven worth more than the whole
material universe.
The question I ask you to- day is not in
regard to your habits. l make no inquiry
about your integrity, or your chastity, or
your sobriety. I do not mean to stan d on
the outside of the gate and ring the bell,
but coming up the steps 1 open the door
and come to the private apartment of the
soul; and with the earnestness of
man that must give an account for this
days work 1 cry out: ''Oh, man, oh, wom-
an immortal, is thine heart right?"
1 will not insult you by an argument TO
prove that we are by nature all wrong. If
there be a factory explosion, and the
smoke stack be upset, and the wheels be
broken in two, and the engine unjointed,
and the ponderous bars be twisted, and
man should look in and say that nothing
was the matter you would pronounce him
a fool. Wei, it needs no acumen to dis
cover that our nature is all atwist, and
askew, and uniointed. The thing doesn't
work right The biggest trouble we have
in the world is with our souls.
Men sometimes say that though their
lives may not be Just right, their heart is
all right. Impossiblel A farmer never
puts the poorest apples on top of his bar
rel; nor does the merchant place the
meanest goods in his show window. The
best part of US is our outward life. do
not stop to discuss whether we all fell in
Adam, for we have been our own Adam,
and have all eaten of the forbidden fruit,
and have been turned out of the paradise
4 of holiness and peace; and though the
/ flaming sword that stood at the gate to
keep us out has changed position and
/ comes behind to drive us in, we will not
! go.
The Bible account of us is not exagger-
ated when it says that we are poor,
and wretched, and. miserable, and blind,
and naked Poor: the wretch that stands
shivering on our doorstep cold day
/ is not so much in need of bread as we are
of spiritual help. Blind: why, the man
whose ewes persisted in the powder blast,
and who for these ten years has gone feel
ing his way from street to street. is not in
such utter darkness as we. Naked: why
there is no one rag of holiness left to hide
the shame of our sin. Sick: why, the lep-
rosy has eaten into the head, and the
heart, and the hands, and the feet; and
the marasmus of an everlasting vast
ing away has already seized on some
of us.
But the meanest thing for man to do
I is to discourse about an evil without point
ing a way to have it remedied. I speak
of the thirst of your hot tongue only that
may show You the living stream that
drops crystalline and sparkling from the
Rock of Ages, and pOurs river of glad.
| ness at your feet. If l show you the
rents in your coat, it is only because
the door of Gods wardrobe now
swings open, and here is a robe, white
with the fleece of the Lamb of God, and
of a cut and make that an angel would
not be ashamed to wear. If l snatch from
you the black, mouldy bread that you are
munching, it is only to give you the bread
made out of the finest wheat that grows
on the celestial hills, and baked in the
fires of the cross, and one crumb of which
would be enough to make all Heaven a
banquet. Hear it, one and all, and tell it
to your friends when you go home, that
the Lord Jesus Christ can make the heart
right.
First we need a repenting heart. If for
the last ten, twenty or forty years of life
we have been going on in the wrong way,
it is time that we turned around and
started in the opposite direction. If we
offend our friends we are glad to apollo
pize. God is our best friend, and yet how
many of us have never apologiz ed for the
wrongs we have done Himl
There is nothing that we so much need
to get rid of as sin. 1t is horrible black
monster. 1t polluted Eden. 1t killed
Christ. 1t has blasted the world. Men
keep dogs in kennels, and rabbits in a
warren, and cattle IN pen. What a man
that would be who would shut them
up in his parlor. But this foul dog
of sin, and these herds of transgres-
sion, we have entertained for many long
year in our heart, which should be the
cleanest, brightest room in all our ature.
Out with the vile herd! Begone, ye be-
foulers of an immortal naturel Turn out
the beasts and let Christ come in
A heather came to an early Christian
who had the reputation of curing diseases.
The Christian said: 'sYou must have all
: your idols destroyed" The heather gave
to the Christian the key to his house, that
he might go in and destroy the idols. He
battered to pieces all he saw, but still the
man did not get we'll. The. Christian said
to him: There must be some idol in
your house not yet destroyed" The
heather confessed that there was one
, idol of beaten gold that he could not bear
to give up. After awhile, when that
t was destroyed, in answer to the pray er
o Z the Christian, the sick man got well.
? Many a man has awakened in his
dying hour to find his sins all about him
They Chamber up on the right side Of the
bed, and on the left side, and over the
headboard, and over the footboard, and
horribly devoured his soul.
I Repent! the voice celestial cries,
Nor longer dare delay;
, The wretch that scorns the mandate dies,
And meets a fiery day.
Again, we need a believing heart. A
good many years ago a weary one went
up to one of the hills of Asia Minor, and
] with two logs on his back cried out to al
the world, offering to carry their sins and
Sorrow. They pursued him. They
e slapped him in the face. They Knocked